The story takes place in the 1930s, during the Great Depression, in West Virginia, along the Ohio River. Harry Powell, a self-anointed preacher, and a serial killer, travels rural roads, preaching in small towns. Arrested for driving a stolen car and sentenced to jail, he meets Ben Harper, a robber who has two children, John and Pearl. After a bank robbery of 10.000 dollars, before his arrest, he arrives home to his two young children and hide the money inside Pearl's rag doll. Powell follows the two kids along the river with the aim of getting the loot. Charles Laughton's only directing effort, The night of the hunter is a cult movie, a complex and mysterious work of rare beauty.